Can't buy love, can buy heartache, 3 local women say

Two of Us dating service gets complaints

Stephen Osman/The Star
Widows Paulette Wachter (left) of Thousand Oaks and Candy Porbansky of Oxnard say they were scammed by a matchmaking company called Two Of Us.

Three local women who went looking for Cupid have declared war on an Encino dating service, saying they were manipulated into doling out exorbitant sums of money for unsatisfactory results.

"I compare it to like a goldfish who sees a nice peaceful pond and jumps in and all he encounters is a bunch of piranha," said Paulette Wachter of Thousand Oaks.

The 61-year-old widow paid $9,500 to Two of Us for matchmaking services. Candy Porbansky, a 52-year-old Oxnard widow, paid $35,000, and Juanetta Dunlap, a 60-year-old Simi Valley divorcee, spent $4,000. All are speaking out now in the hope of protecting others.

"They go after widows," Wachter said. "I was crying when I was in the office. I was thinking of my husband, the love of my life. I lost him to cancer and had just had my heart broken by a guy I'd been dating, and I'm just spilling my guts to these people and they act like they want to save me and do the best for me and that's not at all what they're about. They're just about the money."

Two of Us "emphatically" denies any misrepresentation of its services or the use of high-pressure sales tactics, according to the company's attorney, Ethan D. Baker.

In an e-mail response to written questions, Baker said it's only a small percentage of members who complain, adding that "sometimes complaining members have unrealistic expectations that just cannot be met."

The women interviewed for this article told nearly identical stories. They say "Steve" from Two of Us contacted them after they registered with singles websites, which they speculate provided their contact information. Two of Us is a bricks-and-mortar service, so each of the women traveled to the Encino office, where they endured several hours of paperwork, handed over their credit cards and then got a sales pitch from a woman named "Monique."

According to Wachter, Monique said: " 'Oh, I have the perfect guy for you! In fact I'm going to call him because you're so wonderful and he's going to love you.' "

Porbansky described the same version of events during her encounter with Monique. Both women say Monique got a man on the phone who talked with them.

"Then she says, 'Candy, if you want to go out with him you have to join. Do you want to join, do you want to join?' " Porbansky said. "It was like answer, answer while this guy's on the phone. I just felt trapped. Here I just talked to this guy and he's on the phone and they're waiting for me to say yes or no."

Porbansky said Monique then pulled out a laminated sheet of paper with three prices for her to choose from: $35,000, $60,000 or $80,000.

"My mouth just dropped to the floor," she said. "I was like, isn't there anything cheaper?"

Porbansky wound up paying $35,000 by putting some of it on a credit card and paying the rest in cash. In the ensuing months, she said, she had two unsatisfactory dates and then hired a lawyer to recoup her money.

"This is really embarrassing and it was really hard to come out and do this because I'm not stupid," she said.

The women say they understand why people wonder how anyone could be manipulated into paying so much money when no one was there holding a gun to their heads. But each explained they were worn down after wading through hours of paperwork on an empty stomach while trying to figure out an exit strategy.

Wachter, Porbansky and Dunlap speculate they may have been set up with employees and charged the maximum available on their credit cards.

A lawsuit filed by former employee Michelle Cochran in Los Angeles County in 2005 supports those suspicions. She accused Two of Us owner Toros Yetenekian and a high-ranking company official, Monique Dony, of having employees go on dates with clients and arbitrarily setting prices based on a client's ability to pay.

The case was ultimately settled out of court. Two of Us officials declined to comment about the lawsuit. Baker did say, however, that employees "under no circumstances" pose as satisfied customers and said prices vary because the business has a variety of membership packages, as well as daily specials and discounts.

Yetenekian, 43, played basketball for Idaho State University in the 1980s and has owned dating services with a variety of names, including The Right One, Heart to Heart, Two of Us and Together Inc. They've operated all over the country since at least the mid-1990s and have racked up hundreds of complaints in the courts, with Better Business Bureaus and consumer complaint websites.

Yetenekian's companies are no strangers to media scrutiny. In 2004, CBS 2 news in Los Angeles reported that the BBB had received more than 100 complaints about his "Together" business in the preceding three years.

In 2008, an ABC news station in Pittsburgh (WTAE) found complaints against a Yetenekian company — The Right One — that matches what the three Ventura County women are saying.

The Better Business Bureau of the Southland has 66 complaints against Two of Us. And the agency has given the business a D rating. Many complaints cite high-pressure sales tactics and misrepresented services, while indicating people sought to cancel their memberships and get refunds.

However, the agency notes most people are unable to obtain refunds as the company generally responds by directing clients to their signed contracts, which states no refunds will be made after a three-day cancellation period.

The Los Angeles County Department of Consumer Affairs is investigating five complaints against Two of Us, said Director Rigo Reyes.

"I definitely would like to see consumers file their complaints so our investigators can look into it and figure out how we're going to help them out," he said.

Reyes is aware that the company, formerly called Together Inc., resurfaced with a new name after complaints mounted against Together.

California does not regulate dating services. Consumers can go to court to seek recourse, but the courts haven't been issuing judgments that are likely to dissuade such continuation of what appears to be a lucrative business. Of the 13 cases filed in Los Angeles County against Two of Us since 2009, the majority have been decided in the company's favor. Most of these suits have been filed in small claims court.

Barry McDonald, a Pepperdine University law professor, said consumers who want to cancel a dating service contract would be wise to read the applicable California law, civil code section 1694, which provides that they have the right to cancel a dating service contract by putting a written cancellation notice in the mail by midnight of the third business day after signing a contract. McDonald suggests the notice should be sent via registered mail to preserve documentation.

"Now, if (the consumers) tried to do that and the dating service improperly refused they'll of course have arguments that they violated California's consumer protection laws and, if correct, should be able to void contracts on those grounds," he said.

As for the three women in Ventura County, they are speaking with lawyers and weighing their options.

"They need to be stopped," Dunlap said. "Valentine's Day is coming up. People are going to be calling because they don't want to be alone."